Premortem
The Premortem, developed by psychologist Gary Klein and popularised by Daniel Kahneman in 'Thinking, Fast and Slow', is a structured technique for identifying failure risks before a project or decision begins — not after. It uses prospective hindsight: participants are asked to imagine that the project has already failed spectacularly and to work backwards to diagnose why. This mental time-travel trick is powerful because it bypasses the optimism bias and groupthink that typically suppress risk discussion during planning. When people are asked 'what could go wrong?' they often give polite, vague answers. When asked 'the project failed — what happened?', they access a completely different cognitive mode and produce specific, actionable failure diagnoses. Klein's research showed that prospective hindsight increases the ability to identify correct reasons for future outcomes by 30%. The method is fast, energising, and requires no special materials. It works equally well for product launches, strategic decisions, go/no-go decisions, and organisational changes. Unlike a risk register, it produces vivid narratives that stick — making it far more likely teams will take preventive action.
How to run it
- 1
Set the context: briefly describe the project, decision, or initiative under review. Ensure everyone has the same understanding of the plan.
- 2
The time-travel prompt: tell participants to imagine it is 12–18 months from now, and the project has failed completely. It did not just underperform — it was a disaster.
- 3
Individual writing: give each person 5–7 minutes to silently write as many specific reasons for the failure as they can think of. No filtering — even paranoid or unlikely causes are welcome.
- 4
Round-robin sharing: go around the room and collect one failure reason per person per round. Write each on the board. Continue until all unique reasons are captured.
- 5
Group and prioritise: cluster similar failure modes together. Vote on the top 5–7 most likely and most damaging risks.
- 6
Develop countermeasures: for each top-ranked risk, discuss: Can we prevent this? Can we detect it early if it starts happening? Can we limit damage if it occurs?
- 7
Update the plan: assign owners to the most critical countermeasures and build them into project milestones.
Tips
The facilitator's job is to create psychological safety — explicitly normalise 'paranoid' or 'unlikely' failure modes.
Some of the most valuable insights come from people who privately worried but never voiced their concern.
Keep the premortem output visible throughout the project, not just at kickoff.
Run a postmortem against the premortem predictions at the end to sharpen future risk identification skills.
Variations
Run a 'Pre-success' variant alongside the premortem: imagine the project succeeded beyond all expectations — what made it work? This balanced lens reduces excessive negativity. Combine with Scenario Planning: run a premortem for each of the four scenario quadrants.
Where it fits
Frequently asked questions
When should I use Premortem?â–¾
Use Premortem when you want to: Project kickoff risk review; Strategic decision validation; Product launch preparation; Change management planning; Investment committee preparation.
How long does Premortem take?â–¾
Premortem typically takes 30–60 minutes.
How many participants does Premortem work for?â–¾
Premortem works best for groups of 3–20 participants.
What materials do I need for Premortem?â–¾
To run Premortem you will need: Sticky notes, markers, whiteboard or flip chart.
How difficult is Premortem to facilitate?â–¾
Premortem is rated beginner — straightforward to facilitate even without prior experience.
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Try it freeMethod descriptions on Workshop Weaver are original content written by our team, based on established facilitation practices. This method was inspired by work from Gary Klein, 'Performing a Project Premortem', Harvard Business Review (2007).